42 A HISTORY OF THE BORGIAS
and fifty thousand infidels against Belgrade. Fra Jan Ca-
pistran's eloquence and pious zeal roused the Magyars to
consciousness of the imminent peril; Cardinal Bernardino
Caravajal, the ablegate, inspired their patriotism with his
wisdom and devotion; and Jan Hunniades, the Vaivod of
Hungary, resolved to resist invasion. Confidence in princes
was, as always, vain. The terror-stricken King Wladislaw
fled with his court and his guardian, Count de Cilly, from
Buda to Venice; and along the valley of the Danube poured
the locust-swarms of Infidels to invest Belgrade. The
Vaivod Jan Hunniades raised an army at his own expense;
whence came the means, the men, is still unknown, for
most important documents connected with the siege of
Belgrade yet attend discovery: but there was a Magyar
army, commanded by Jan Hunniades, ministered to by
Fra Jan Capistran, which advanced to relieve Belgrade;
and the ablegate, Fra Bernardino Caravajal, remained be-
hind at Buda, by the Vaivod's request, to collect and for-
ward reinforcements. On the fourteenth day of siege the
Magyars collided with the Infidels. Already the walls of
Belgrade sorely were shaken: but the arrival of the Vaivod,
breaking the Muslim line and winning a complete victory,
put courage into the hearts of the beleaguered. In three
months time, once more the Muslim concentrated, and on
the twenty-first of July the city suffered a second storm.
Jan Hunniades and Fra Jan Capistran, from one of the
towers, directed the defence. At a crisis in the fray, the
heroic friar rushed, like a second Joshua, through the
Christian host, waving the crucifix and a banner with the
sacred monogram invented by San Bernardino of Siena.
Behind him came the Vaivod with aid. Through breaches
in the walls many times the Infidels streamed in, and always
the stream was dammed and driven back. Fra Jan Capis-
tran himself led a squadron of Magyar h^szarsI who put
1 Hussar, derived by a roundabout route from Italian cossaro,
corsair, reelance (v. Murray).